Abstrusa Unde are a Progressive Goth/Black Metal Band based in France, founded in 2007 by vocalist Thibault.

The band were in a quest to combine several musical styles together and I feel they have done this perfectly with this album. The music is based on the Orpheus Myth, exploring various musical landscapes from electro to black metal, included guitar riffs, drums, keyboards, both male and female vocals, but also classical instruments such as violins and a cello.

I have to say I do love an album that sets the atmosphere and Introspection starts off with a beautiful classical piano piece before introducing organs and other classical instruments, giving the album a dark and haunting feel, before the amazing and beautiful female vocals kick in, giving the album a very dark gothic feeling before the aggressive black metal vocals take over, pushing the female vocals into the background, which just worked perfectly.

The contrast of the vocals compliments each other beautifully reminding me of bands such as Cradle of Filth/Epica and Nightwish but with a darker twist but this band certainly have their own unique sound to them.

With the band working for nearly two years on this project, it seemed too ambitious and the group was abandoned with them only releasing a demo back in June of 2008, but after a few line-up changes, the band are now back and have produced an amazing and unique album.

Due to the diversity of this band I feel many music fans will appreciate this release, from gothic fans, to dark/black metal fans and this is certainly an album that deserves to be heard, and one I am happy to hear over and over! I hope to hear more from these guys in the future…great work guys and defo worth the wait.